Why Entertainment Brands Should Utilize Influencer Marketing

Experiential marketing is one of the most exciting and tangible marketing efforts you can do as a brand in the entertainment industry. It allows you to connect your brand to consumers. Events can improve brand awareness and relationships with consumers while creating memorable experiences for everyone involved. Imagine, then, the possibilities of combining influencer marketing into an experiential campaign.

What is influencer marketing?

Influencer marketing is powerful and is becoming more popular by the day. It places marketing efforts in the hands of social influencers who promote your event, product, or brand. Social media and online purchasing now means consumers rely on the words and ratings of others to inform their decisions. Influencer marketing drives interest with word-of-mouth from those whom potential clients trust. YouTube product testers, Instagram influencers, online ratings, and more make a significant difference in how a business or product fares.

Identifying these influencers and directing your event marketing campaign toward them may make a huge impact on your marketing campaign.

How to find influencers

Finding influencers (read: the right influencers) can be a challenge. You have to know the demographics of your audience and goals of your event first. From there, you can begin to identify the primary influencers that fall into your demographic. This means finding the Instagram or YouTube accounts with a large following that frequently promote brands. You can set filters based on categories, social media platform, location, influencer’s audience, and your target audience. There are many tools to help you do this.

If they agree to work with your brand, influencers can do a number of things:

Promote your brand

Use your product and share

Promote your event

Attend the event and share their experience

The options here really are endless. The goal of influencer marketing is to find influencers and have them share their honest experiences with their followers. Cost can range here depending on the influencer and what you are having them do, but many influencers do have a price so keep that in mind. You also want to remember that the more honest and real you allow the influencers to be, the more their followers will believe it. Find someone that would genuinely fit your brand (by following your set demographics).

Why influencer marketing?

Out of 86% marketers who used influencer marketing in 2017, 92% of them found it useful. – Linqia Report

Combining influencer marketing and events can double your event’s power without necessarily increasing the work. Event staff (like our brand ambassadors) provide the experience, influencers promote and provide the report, and your brand’s reach expands further than you imagined. It’s a win for everyone.

According to Search Engine People, “the reason influencers generate sales effectively is that they are social celebrities with high engagement rates. Their photos and videos reach thousands, or even millions of people. And even a small percentage increase in conversions can generate a large increase sales.”

If you’re looking for that increase in attendance, engagement, sales, or even just brand recognition, we highly recommend you check out influencer marketing. 2018 is the year of the influencer and you don’t want your brand to be left behind.